Best Day ever!!!

A couple of days ago while out wandering the lovely Riverside Park, we came across a paddle boat rental spot.  Thinking this would be a fun thing to do with Alisha, we rented two boats.  One for the boys and one for the "goyles".  A life jacket was provided for Alisha to wear.  She was very apprehensive which should been a big indicator that she really was not to keen on getting into this tiny yellow paddle boat and sailing off into the big lake.  We did try to tell her that it was only a small meandering river (the flow of the water, does not really match the name:  Speed River).  Anyway, being the over zealous Nana that I am  and trying to cram as much fun into a week that I can and you know,,,,, build some memories,,,, I told Alisha that it really was very shallow and even Mermaids can't live in it because it is not deep enough.  We did give her the choice of going with Papa and Bradley or with Mommy and Nana.  Of course she picked the the ladies, because after all "Goyles Rule".  You can see by this photo that she was not impressed and after about five minutes, we peddled our way back into the dock to let the little Princess put her feet back onto dry land.  I honestly thought she just might kiss the ground when she disembarked the Titanic!!



 

We can't always plan things for this little kidlets thinking that they will "love" things that we may really like to do, when in reality what we may chose may either bore them to tears or terrify them!  So when we decided to take a drive over to Stratford which is internationally recognized  for its annual Shakespeare Festival, I thought this would be a trip to bore her completely.  The town is beautiful and quaint.  I would love to come back here and take in some of the festivities.  Little did I know, or maybe I did know but had forgotten, that Justin Beiber is from Stratford.  Mind you, had I known or remembered, it would not have made any difference to me one way or another.  But to one little girl who was riding in the back seat of the truck, it certainly meant a whole lot! 

 

After finding a parking space which was extremely difficult as tourists from everywhere were also searching for a vacant space to park their car, truck, camper, motorcycle or bus!  We managed to get a spot just down the street from the Avon Theatre.  The Avon Theatre is a beautiful old vaudeville house and fondly reminded me of the beautiful Orpheum Theatre in Vancouver.  There was a woman taking a photo of two very giddy little girls in front of the theatre.  Riki all of a sudden says to Alisha,,, "oh my gosh, this is THE Avon theatre, where Justin Beiber used to sing in front of!"  OMG,,,, you would not believe the reaction of this adorable little (almost 4 year old) wearing a beautiful princess crown!  She started squealing,,, I mean S Q U E A L I N G!!!  You would have thought she was 13 years old!  Wouldn't you know it, not only was this "the" theatre, but there was a "star" with Justin Beiber's name on it right in front of the stairs.  For a minute I thought I was really in Los Angeles in front of Gorman Theatre!   But of course this Nana had to get in on the excitement and told Alisha to stand by the star and we would get a picture of her.  Naturally, this was the time that I had not brought my camera, but we did manage to take a shot of her on Riki's phone.  You would have thought this little girl was actually standing in front of the Beiber himself, she was beside her self!

 

After we managed to peel Alisha away from the Beiber, we poked our way through the town.  We were entertained by some street musicians, some better than others.  The best was two little girls playing the violins.  Very cute!  We bought Alisha a pair of shoes for school before heading back to Guelph.  On the way out of the shoe store Alisha said to Papa,,,,, "This is the best day ever!"

 

 

 

 

We made a stop at a roadside vegetable stand  in Shakespeare and decided to "buy local".  We bought some sweet corn from the stand.  Just down the road we stopped in at "Porky Pigs" and bought some beautiful pork chops for the bar-b-que.  What we did not realize until we actually cooked them for dinner was that it was a "smoked" pork chop which was actually thick slices of "ham".  It was good but when you are expecting a chop, I was a wee bit dissapointed!

 

Good night, until the next "best day ever",,,,

 

Ray and Lori

 



University, Pony's, Zumba,,,or was that Yoga?

Since arriving in Guelph on the 25th, we have been busy happy in our Nana and Papa rolls.  I thought I would provide you with a little bit of information around the area.  The city of Guelph has a population of 120,000 mind you when University is in session that could bring the total up considerably.  Guelph is somewhat of a university town.  The University of Guelph is widely known for its Veterinary, Agricultural, Engineering, Biological and Physical Sciences studies.  The university is situated in the central part of the city and takes up 330 hectares.  On this land site is also the famous 165 hectare Arboretum.  There are hundreds of different plants and trees with walking trails throughout the campus.  If I had gone to university, Guelph University has always been a favourite of mine with its old students halls etc.

The Biltmore Hat factory is also in Guelph.  Many different styles of hats have been made in the Biltmore Hat factory.  The Fedora hats for men from the 30's and 40's, was made right in here in Guelph.  They do make some hats for women as well.  But the probably the most recognizable hats that are made at Biltmore is the Stetson that the RCMP proudly wear with their dress uniform, the Red Serge.

There are many parks in Guelph, but the only one that I have personally visited is Riverside Park.  This very large park has an old carousel and a small train for the kids to ride. Weather the kids are big or small, they all enjoy their ride.  As you can see from the pictures here that small kids and big kids LOVE riding this old beauty!

Alisha obviously enjoying her ride:

Papa?  Not so sure?

 



Yesterday Riki (my daughter) asked me if I would like to join her in her Zumba class.  For those of you who do not know what Zumba is, it is a fitness class that is a combination of latin dance moves and aerobics.  Had I Googled Zumba before I said yes, I should have clued in to what was in store of me.  I tried aerobics in the 70's and 80's but found the pace was way to fast for me, even at that young age.  But agreeing to go,  I put on my "yoga" pants and tops, slipped my hot sweaty feet into my running shoes (which have never yet been worn) and off we went.  The class was in an old warehouse, which had a large roll up door.  One of the ladies in the class tried to roll open the door at the start of the class, but it was  locked.  I take my place next to Riki and Barb (Riki's mother-in-law) at the back of the class (thank goodness) and the music started.  I kept my eyes on the front of the class where the instuctor was starting her moves.  The first song was quite slow and I thought, "oh this is not bad at all".  I soon realize there is no air flow in this room, no air conditioner or fans.  Song number two comes on and all of a sudden we are hippity hoppiting, left and right, then boxing the air and jumping down into squats,,, then hippity hoppiting left and right again, Or was that right and left???  After almost crashing into the poor young girl on my right, I realized that I was supposed to be going left and not right.  Sheesh!!!  The instructor had changed directions!  Now we are shaking our belly and boobys,,, now squatting,,,, lunging,,, and stepping left and right,,,right and left again,,,,, YIKES!!  I lasted exactly 25 minutes!  At which point, I almost tripped over Riki when I said "I am fine, but will be waiting out in the truck for you". 

As I sat waiting for Riki and Barb in the truck, I came to the realization that this Zumba with its fancy moves is just not for me.  It wasn't for me in the 70's when it was called Aerobics and 20 plus years later it is still not for me.  I am much more into connecting with my spiritual mind and physical body.  I guess that is why I much prefer practising Yoga than to jumping around on a concrete floor like a monkey!

Stay tuned for more of our Bogus Adventures....

Lori and Ray

Alisha's 4th Birthday Party

The purpose of the long driving days was because that we had a very important event in Guelph to get to by Saturday the 25th.  Our little granddaughter was having her 4th birthday party.  She had sent us an invitation a month ago and when I talked to her I had reminded her that Nana & Papa lived very far away and would not be able to come.  You might be wondering why if we were heading this way anyway, that I would say that we were not coming to the party.  You never know what can happen when you are travelling and what kinds of detours that may come up that would cause a person to be a day late for a destination.  I mean we could have run out of gas somewhere and been stuck and extra day because we would have had to hitch hike to some point of civilization because of course, we would have run out of gas in the middle of some godforsaken place!  I would have felt awful if something made us late and did not want to disappoint her.  Anyway as we drove down the street on Saturday towards the house with the balloons tacked to the tress, I called Alisha on my almost "dead" cell phone.  Riki had Alisha out in the front yard.  I asked Alisha how her party was going and she said it was fun.  I said it is too bad that Nana and Papa lived so far away and then told her to look up the street, which by then we had pulled up to the curb and parked.  I said to her on the phone as she is looking in our direction, "we did come to your party Alisha,,,,we are here"!  Remember she is only 4 years old.  She looks up the street at me standing by the truck and just stares with a confused look on her face!  Of course being a Nana, I ran towards her.  I think she was in shock because it took her a few minutes to realize that we were actually standing here.  When she took off into the back yard yelling "my Nana and Papa came to my party",,,, I knew that she was beyond excited!

 

Let the party begin!

 

 

On the drive from Eagle Lake to Guelph was a bit "interesting"...especially when we drove through Orangeville. I have driven this route south from Hwy 400 a few times and felt that I knew pretty much where I was navigating.  But I have always bypassed Orangeville and not actually driven through it.  Every time I tried to get the GPS to direct us back to the direction of Guelph, it appeared that it was taking us down these country roads.  Well GPS are much more accurate then me especially as without mountains to guide me, I do not know North from East, if you catch my drift.  We did not get lost, but we had arrived later than I thought we would at the party.  I am adding this simply so you don't think it is only Ray that does "crazy" stuff!

 

 

Until next blog,,,,,, 



Sault Ste Marie to Eagle Lake

After reviewing the previous pages I realize that I forgot to share a bit of trivia about White River, which is east of Thunder Bay.  As we were approaching this tiny little berg there were signs along the highway with giant pictures of Winnie the Pooh and the wording "Where it all began".  As we came into this rather drab looking town, there in the middle was a brightly coloured Winnie the Pooh park and what appeared to be the remnants of a festival of some sort.  Of course my curiosity got the best of me and as soon as I had Internet connection I searched on Google.  The Readers Digest version is that a Veterinarian who was also a Capt in the army purchased an orphaned bear cub from a trapper in White River.  This Captain was from Winnipeg, so he named the bear cub "Winnie".  The Captain's troop was sent to England and Winnie went along as their mascot.  Before shipping off to France, Winnie was donated to the London Zoo where a little boy named Christopher saw him and fell in love with him. This inspired Christopher's father, A.A. Milne to write the Winnie the Pooh stories.  Every year the little town of White River has a Winnie the Pooh festival to celebrate this adorable little bear!

Moving on, we spent a night in Sault Ste Marie which is the 3rd largest city in northern Ontario is a  border town bordering Sault Ste Marie Michigan.  Sault in French is pronounced "so" (sou) in French or "soo" (su) in English.  The campsite we stayed in was about 10 minutes out of town.  As has become our norm in this part of our journey we are not spending much time poking around the towns as we are on a mission to get down to Guelph for Alisha's 4th birthday party.

We left the "Soo" early in the morning to head to Eagle Lake which is just outside of Haliburton in the beautiful Muskoka.  For those of you not from Ontario, the Muskoka region is home to some of the most beautiful lakes and cottages in Ontario.  My sister Joann and her family have lived in the Muskoka's and Parry Sound on the beautiful Georgian Bay (my personal favourite area) for over 27 years.  We drove "through" Sudbury looking for the giant Nickle, only to discover that you actually do have to get off the highway and drive through the town.  Needless to say, we missed the big Nickle which Sudbury is famous for.  We continued east through North Bay and then finally headed south towards Bracebridge.

Not to disappoint anyone who has been following Ray and his love of running the truck on empty, he does it again!  Unlike some places in the U.S., that will have a sign that indicates "last service staion for 150 miles" etc,,, Ontario does not do this, or certainly not the roads we have been travelling.  We had fuelled the truck in Coniston, just outside of Sudbury as we approached Bracebridge the fuel gauge is indicating between quarter of a tank and empty, but leaning more to the empty side.  As we were taking the Bracebridge exit to head towards Eagle Lake we noticed some service staion signs which would have directed us right into Bracebridge which is heading in the opposite direction.  Ray said there would be more stations on the way to Eagle Lake.  About 15 minutes later we passed a station where the price was $1.38 which of course my loving husband said he could get it cheaper down the road.  Well would he not know by now that when you see a service station in this part of the country you really should fill up.  So on we go with the needle now on empty.  My ulcer that I am sure that I have is slowly growing.  Every corner we go around I am hoping to spot a gas station, but none are to be seen.  We do have cell coverage which is good as I would be able to call my sister if we do get stuck.  After another 15 minutes we finally see a very large (four pumps is large in this neck of the woods) service station.  There is yellow tape (like police tape) surrounding all of the pumps.  But as we are on empty I am sure this must be a mistake!  We stop, I almost run into the store to ask if they have gas.  The somewhat older laid back fellow behind the counter says "nope, no gas here, we are allll out".  Seriously????  He tells me there is a station just down the road (which can mean 1 km to 50 kms) in Eagle Lake.  I am almost in tears!!  I head out and tell Ray, who is not looking very well!  The gas tank is "dinging",,,,,,,arg! We head off.  About 5 kms down the road we spot the sign for the Eagle Lake turn off.  As we round the corner we "almost" cheer when we see the tiny service station!  The price was $1.29 and I was secretly hoping that it was $1.46 because that would have taught him a lesson!  The young station attendant comes sauntering out and Ray is talking and joking with him like he is the easy going tourist!!!  As he went in to pay for the gas, I holler out my window "Ray Riggins, you are a jerk"! 

We made it to Joann and Tom's and spent three nights with them.  We were entertained by the beautiful Olivia

and Maya here with Gramma Jo

We had to say good bye to Jo and Tom and continue down to Guelph where we will spend a week to 10 days visiting more family. 

Stay tuned for more travels,,,,,

Lori and Ray

Beautiful Kakabeka Falls

After leaving the southern town of Fort Francis, Ray decided that we would drive part way to Thunder Bay. We had asked someone at Starbucks if there was camping between Fort Francis and Thunder Bay and were told that they thought there was camping in Atikokan which is in Quetico Provincial Park.  About 2 hours later we come to Atikokan and look for a campground. We find a cute little spot. The problem was there was way too many Mosquitoes. These Mosquito's were the size of house flies. The site were also very uneven, so we decided to go a bit farther down the road. I looked on the map and asked Ray if he thought he should gas up. He said no we had a bit more than a quarter of a tank and he said we were good until the next "town".   I bet you know where I am taking you with this story?  We get to the next "town", which consists of a rundown little gas pump and a store selling "live bait" and hunting licenses.  We pull up to the pump and Ray sees the price is $1.46.9.  So he puts the truck in gear and takes off saying "I am not paying that for gas!".  I lean over and see the gauge is just above the red line. I take out the map and see there is a junction in the hwy coming up where we would be turning to continue into Thunder Bay. This place was about 27 kms away and would surely have a gas pump. About 20 minutes later, we get to the junction where this so called town is supposed to be, and there was nothing there! No store, no gas pump, no people and no cell service! We are well into the red by now on the gauge!  I am seriously starting to panic. Kakabeca Falls (just outside of Thunder Bay) is about 25 kms down the road, but I know we are not going to make it. We will run out of gas and with no cell service, then what? We go around a couple of bends in the road and what to my delight,,,,a gas station! As we pull up to the pump, the bell starts dinging! Seriously! The best part? It cost $1.43.9 per liter, so Ray saved himself 3 cents a liter and almost gave his wife an ulcer!  And you wonder why I called this Lori and Ray's Bogus Adventure?

We make it into Kakabeka Falls where we camp for the night.  We had a beautiful quiet spot.  So quiet in fact that I had a hard time sleeping! But eventually I slept!  In the morning we packed up and left early and drove back to the Falls.  Ray has never been to the northern part of Ontario and the falls are so beautiful that I wanted him to see it.

We had a long drive yesterday (9.5 hours) and we have two more long days (1 really because today is over!) of driving to make it to my sister Joann's, place near Haliburton. I had wanted to hook up with Camille from work who now lives in TB but was only able to talk to her on the phone.  Did you know that Thunder Bay has about 110,000 residents and a Police Force of approximately 200 members?  Their dispatch office answers only 911 calls (non-emergency calls are answered in a different area by Cadets who are wanting to get on as members).  So to answer the 911 calls there are 3 full time call takers, one CPIC Dispatcher (who does not add any CPIC's only does the queries for the members) and one Dispatcher.  Thanks Camille for that info, our friends at Abby might be interested in that.

Our travels today took us around Lake Superior.  That is one huge lake!  It is the largest of all the Great Lakes.  It actually looks like an ocean not a lake.  The beaches are sandy and the water at the beaches is blue/green.  It is just beautiful!  Driving from Thunder Bay to Sault Ste Marie (fondly known as "the Soo") Ray was very surprised to have to take that poor Chev up so many inclines!  The Chev worked very hard, and not once did the gas gauge get lower than a quarter of a tank!

Along the way we stopped for a stretch and a coffee (Tim Horton's this time) at Wawa.  For those of you who have never driven in this part of the country Wawa is know for its very large goose statue at the entrance to the town.  If you Google the Wawa Goose, you will find out why the statue is so popular.  Right now, my fingers are aching and I am fading away, so I am not googling it for you... I will say good night and leave you with these pictures of the Wawa Goose!  

Stay tuned for more Bogus Fun on our adventure,,,,,Lori and Ray

 

And of course,,,, Mr Funny!

Ontario or bust!

On Monday, we left the center of North America at 0818 hrs. We were at a junction in the road, we're we going to head north from Rugby into Manitobia or continue heading east through to Minnesota as planned?  Aw what the heck, neither of us have been to Minnesota and it had been the original plan. So continued east we did. About an hour into the drive we noticed a helicopter flying fairly low to the ground. As he flew low over the highway over our truck, Ray put the window down to wave at the pilot. That was when we got a huge whiff on chemical smell! It was disgusting! Obviously the pilot was not just out for a nice Monday flight, he was crop dusting! This was no organic farm we were driving past .  We continued our way through North Dakota noticing the terrain was getting less flat with some rolling hills. We were also leaving behind the the wheat fields and the beautiful fields sunflowers with their faces smiling at the sky. I hope that helicopter doesn't spit in their pretty faces!

Minnesota, well at least the area on Highway 2 is very beautiful. It is lush with groups of trees and pin neat homes.  Not being farmers, we can only guess that the fields we saw were full of potatoes! There was also corn and smaller versions of sunflowers with darker faces, not the usual sunny yellow that we had been seeing.  We saw not one oil field/refinery!

At Bemidji we headed north. Bermidji is home to Paul Bunyan and his blue ox named Babe. But I bet you didn't know that Bemidji is where the Mississippi begins its very long journey south. Truthfully, I didn't know that little fact until I googled it. I love Google! Anyway what we saw of this little town was very quaint with old brick buildings and once again very neat and tidy as though the residents are proud of their little town.

We drove for miles and miles with the highway to ourself. I think school started on Tuesday so all the lovely little families were not out driving around looking for campsites, like the Riggins' were doing! Well at that point we were hell bent on getting to Into Ontario.  We were crossing at International Falls.  Now I have to ask you what you envision when you hear that name? International Falls,,,, beautiful green rolling hills with flowers, birds (yeah throw in a bee or two for fun!) and of course some beautiful waterfalls!

Well we pull into this rather drab for what we had seen earlier in Minnesota, little border town.  There were no flowers, bees or birds. I think there was a waterfall because I did hear it for a split second when I rolled down my window at the toll bridge. Yup, it cost us $10 to leave Minnesota, which Ray paid with a big smile.  I only had my window down for a split because,,,,,,there was a pulp mill on the US side and of course the Canadians don't want to be outdone, so there was one on the Canadian side too. What a stink!!

The most positive thing about this particular experience for moi, you may be wondering?  As we cross into Fort Francis and wound our way through the streets, I spotted a Safeway and hanging my head out the window I looked for and saw,,,,,,Starbucks! At that minute I really didn't care if the town was stinky or not,,,,Ray,,,look,,,Starbucks,,,,,pleasssse let's stop for a Latte.

My wonderful husband gladly pulled into the parking lot! I love him so much! It was the best coffee either of us had had in days!

Center of Things

Before I start our travels of the day, I have to share a rather funny story.  Ray is the best cook in our house, in fact he makes the most amazing pies!  When we have guests for dinner, he does the cooking as I cannot be trusted not to ruin the dinner.  Which I have done on more than one occasion!  I am okay with this, as you probably know.  I HATE cooking!  So last night we were going to have a nice steak with a baked potato.  Ray said the potato would take an hour to cook on the bar-b-que.  So he prepared it and put it on to bake, planning on turning it every 15 minutes.  Well he got a bit tied up with these US phones we have so I did the turning for him (mmm now that I am writing this, maybe that is why the story ends the way it does??).  We are taking turns flipping the spud.  It was pretty hard and rather big, so Ray says lets go for a walk as it looks like the potato will be awhile.  We went for a short walk, and when we came back we poked the potato.  It was still hard as a rock so he turned up the heat!  About 5 or 10 minutes later we thought we smell something burning.  So Ray takes the  take the foil off the potato to find it charcoal black!  Yes it was burned beyond eating!!!  So while Ray put the steak on to cook, I threw another potato in the microwave (yeah we are camping in style!) and cooked it.  Next thing I know Ray is on the phone again.  I go and lift the lid on the bar-b-y to check on the status of the steak.  We like our steak medium rare not dead and cooked to death.  The steak appeared to be overcook because it had black on one side!!!  He never ruins anything!!!  Must of been tired!  We did eat the overcook steak and my perfect potato.  Here is a picture of Ray's burned potato,,,,, yeah I just can't let this go by!

Okay enough of teasing Ray,,, moving foraward.

Well this morning, our 5th day started with two rather grumpy people. Remember I mentioned the train in last nights post?  Well when we booked in, the clerk said I hope that you do not mind trains.  Having camped many times at Derby's Reach and hearing the trains across the river we thought it would not be too bad.  Well last night about every 30 or 40 minutes a train roared through directly behind our campsite!  It was awful!  Needless to say neither of us got too much sleep.

We were up and on the road by 0750.  While the campsite itself was nice, we just can't get passed the train so would not recommend staying there.  So we head off towards North Dakota.  The rest of our travels through Montana revealed long lonely roads between some very small towns.  Not much happening in the northern part of Montana!  Lots and lots of wheat fields and rolling hills especially as you get closer to the North Dakota border.

North Dakota appears to be a much more prosperous State.  We saw many oil rigs, in fact more than we saw in the part of Alberta that we were in.  I am curious what northern Alberta looks like, by the oil fields!  There was also wheat fields galore, and also corn and sunflower fields.  The sunflower fields where huge!  What we did see that we found quite odd was miles and miles of camps with RV's and an ATCO village.  Rows and rows of ATCO trailers made into accommodations.  We think that both the RV parks and the ATCO village are likely set up for the workers in the oil rigs. One of the huge 5th wheels we saw said "8 person bunks" for rent.  It was enormous!

As some of you know me quite well, you will know that I like to be in the "middle" of all the action.  We tonight we are camping in Rugby N. Dakota. The thing that makes Rugby famous is that it is the "Geographical Center of North America".  Which means it is in the center of it all!  It is 1450 miles from here to the Arctic Circle and 2050 miles to Acapulco Mexico.  Lebec Maine is 1500 miles and Neah Bay Washington is 1100 miles.  Seems a bit out of whack with Acapulco being 2050 miles,,, but that is what the sign said.  What is cool about the monument is that they have the US flag, Canadian flag and the Mexico flag flying together.  Very cool!

And of course, a closer shot of the actual wording on the monument, and guess who?

Stay tuned for more of Ray and Lori's Bogus Adventure!!!

Lori and Raytard!

Montana Really Big Sky Country!

We were packed up and leaving Drumheller by 0830 this morning.  No sleeping for this girl as Ray likes to be on the road early and hopefully stop for the day early as well.  We drove down to Medicine Hat where on the highway there is a sign welcoming you to Medicine Hat and directly under the sign is another sign saying "Gas Capital of the Prairies".  So that sign got me to thinking what exactly were they growing in the endless fields that we passed?  Beans?  Looked like wheat to me!!!  Oh maybe they meant gas as in petroleum?  Speaking of gas,,,, as we were coming into Medicine Hat, I asked Ray if we should gas up the truck.  He said no, we had a quarter of a tank which would likely get us to Wild Horse which is the crossing into Montana.

We passed through Medicine Hat and continued south towards the border.  Hwy 41 heading south appeared to be a secondary highway as it was a two lane road with no shoulders whatsoever.  There was very little traffic on this road.  Well for the first 20 miles or so we saw a number of vehicles heading north.  A few times I nonchalantly leaned over to check the status of our fuel tank and from my point of view on the passenger side it appeared to be on "E" which we all know means empty.  I started to periodically check my cell service to make sure that we had service which incidentally we did not.  There was less and less vehicle traffic which I felt meant there was less and less population that we might run into in case we did run out of gas.  I did not know that Ray was driving along sweating bricks because from his view the gauge did say "E"......  We saw a turn off for a small town called Elkwater and also a sign for fuel and camping.  That was about the time that Ray told me he was starting to get  bit worried!  Anyway we did fuel up at this very quaint little gas station/restaurant.  While Ray was gassing up I checked out the bakery in the restaurant and bought a piece of strawberry rhubarb pie for Ray and a cinnamon bun for me.  Hope they are as tasty as they smelled in the bakery!

Crossing the border into Montana, we had no line up,,, I guess on Saturday they have no rush for the Canadians to go down to shop in Havre?  In fact it took the guard a few minutes to appear.  I think he was sleeping and had to quickly slosh mouthwash into his mouth so he did not kill Ray with his monkey breath!  Anyway we had no problems whatsoever with crossing the border into Montana.  Montana's licence plates say "Big Sky Country" and that it is!  Yellow and brown fields run for miles and miles as far as you can see.  The road winds like ribbon through the fields and the sky is so blue!  It really is beautiful.  The ride down to Havre was quite lonely as there was no other vehicles on the road.  I would hate to think what it would be like travelling in the middle of the winter!  Glad we do not have to find that out.

We are parked in a very nice little spot called Edgewater Inn and RV Park in Malta Montana, except for the *&&%$#** trains!!!  Off to have a couple of well deserved cold ones.  Ray is ecstatic as we are getting between 16 and 17 miles per gallon!  Buy for now,,,,Lori and Ray

Kamloops to Drumheller

I am sharing this picture of the truck and 5th wheel just as we were heading out on Wednesday morning.  We left early and of course had to stop at Timmy's for a coffee for the road.  I took this shot at the Mission TH.  As our truck is only a 1500, the worse part of this journey will be coming through the snow shed on the Coquihalla.  As anticipated the Chev grunted its way up the long hill and successfully made it to the summit.  Yay!!!  You could just watch the gas gauge dropping by the minute!  But hey,,, we knew this before we started out on this trip.  We arrived in Kamloops where we had prearranged to spend the night at Ron & Mary Friesen's RV "spot".  Thanks so much Ron and Mary for the great accomadations!  We were able to have a great visit with the newly engaged, Tanya and Dean.  What a beautiful ring!!!  We are so happy for the two of you.

The drive from Kamloops into Canmore was very uneventful.  I was hoping to catch sight of some wildlife, but there was none to be had.  We did pass a place at Jade Mountain that had an old looking "store" called "Rustic Mountain Furniture".  Now what does "rustic" really mean?  Does it mean slightly used, very old, or furniture made from logs?  I think some day I will have to check that place out, I may want to refurnish a room or two!

The drive through Sicamous was so beautiful and I had expected to see the Shuswap lake littered with hundreds of houseboats.  But we saw only one houseboat and as there were very few at the wharf I can only surmis that the others were out beyond our sight from the highway.  Saw a sign that said "Segway Tours",,, so that could be something to do one day when Ray thinks he should park his Harley!  Somehow I doubt that is going to happen anytime soon!!

We drove through Rogers Pass and of course the scenery of the mountains was breathtaking.  I never tire of looking at the rugged mountains especially as we approach Revelstoke and other areas east.  While going through Golden, I am busy trying to spot the Kicking Horse River (which we rafted down a few years back).  All of a sudden Ray says "What's this idiot doing".  I look up to see a mini van crossing the road in front of us.  The van was heading west and we are heading east.... then we saw this man walk out almost in front of us, and with his arms tells us to slow down.  It was then we noticed that there was a bright yellow stripe running down the leg of his trousers..... that Pony Rider could have pulled Ray over and written him a ticket,,,,but he just waved us on and yelled at us to slow down. Phew! 

Our plan had been to spend the night in Lake Louise, but we somehow missed the turn off.  So we ended up spending the night in Canmore.  The campsite was a community site and was a bit run down which was disappointing.  But we went for a walk and I took a photo of the Three Sisters, just for Tan and Shelly!

On the way out of Canmore I saw a sign on Hwy 1 (busy road) that said "watch for pedestrians".  Now all through Yoho and Banff National parks you see signs that say "watch for wildlife".  so we watched very carefully and did not see one pedestrian!

We are in Drumheller as I type this.  As we drove into this fairly small town there were some green and purple dinosaurs and a bright orange sabre tooth tiger, in front of some businesses.  As the purpose of coming to Drumheller was to visit the Royal Tyrell Museum.  The thought stuck me that I hoped that the museum was not going to have a tacky purple dinosaur at the entrance to the building.  We were pleasantly surprised as there was no tacky looking dinosaurs in sight.  The museum was amazing!  It is hard to believe what roamed the earth so many millions of years ago.  Of course now that I am back at the campsite I can't remember what the difference between a T-Rex or any other of those dino creatures is!!   Ray truly enjoyed this visit!

As we have not been too lucky in having internet connection so far, we will likely only do a post to this blog every few days.  I hope I don't bore you to death with my ramblings along this Bogus Adventure of ours.  Have a great weekend!! Lori and Ray



Bucket Lists,,,

Mostly everyone has a "bucket list' of things they want to do in their lifetime,,,one of the things on our (mine and Ray's) list is to travel across Canada.  So very soon we will be packing the 5th wheel and heading in an easterly direction.  I created this blog to use as a "journal" to document our trip.  Stay tuned for some fun and crazy adventures (well maybe not "that" crazy) as we begin our Bogus Adventure!!